How The Garden Does Grow and Thoughts on Eating Local

The garden in three stages.

With the sun comes growth. I am loving looking out the window today to see corn that is nearly as tall as me and peppers on the plant and flowers on the tomatoes. How lucky are we to have fresh eggs everyday, snap peas, and so much more to come as the summer meanders its way to fall.

It Is Finally Garden Season

At least for now. No rain for a couple of days and, if you can believe it, SUN. I had to water!

I worked outside for almost two hours today. A first since my surgeries. The strawberries are brilliant red, the blueberries are bluing, and the peas are finally getting fat. We thought they would never mature as they went in the ground late again this year. So, I must be grateful for the rainy days on behalf of the peas. The spinach that also loved the cold, damp days is ready to harvest.

I started a new tater patch this morning. I need to read up on raising healthy potatoes that don't get eaten by whatever is eating the first ones I put in. I have high hopes for my own Yukon Golds.

Although cranky about the fact that the corn might not be "knee high by the fourth of July", the garden is loving the sun. Everything is headed to the heavens. Tomato plants look like plants and not little knobs pushing through the dark soil. The sage plant is trying for a take over of it's corner of the garden. I already have a good bunch drying in my "farm" kitchen. I guess I better make some sage rubbed chicken thighs once it crisps up enough to be run through the grinder.

The oregano plant that nearly died when growing in a pot out front is so big and lovely that I have to make some kind of Italian something so I can crush it up in my hands and then take a deep, long, whiff of the aroma.

We have such a constant supply of eggs from Laverne, Bruiser Woods, Buffy, Dolly, and Penny. There are enough to keep us in all we need and enough to share with friends. Life is good, the garden is good, and I am healing. If you don't plant a garden, you should. It gives one time to pause and take in the beauty that is things that grow and bloom.

Late Harvest Creations.

It is October. The sun is dipping lower in the sky and the days are shorter. Because we live in the pacific northwest fall means less sun and a return to the rainy season.

With less sun on the garden, many things aren't growing any bigger. Tomatoes aren't ripening on the vine. Melons that got a late start won't ever get big enough to eat. But, I am not willing to just let it all go. For me, the challenge is to find ways to use what we have. Tomatillos, green tomatoes, onions and the last of the green chiles will become sauce for enchiladas and whatever else this winter. Squash will get roasted and turned into a puree for soups. Same with pumpkins.

The cabbages like the cool weather and will be ready to harvest soon. The heads are dense and look lovely. i am bound and determined to make kim chi with some of it. I am not sure what to do with the rest to preserve it. We still have carrots and kale that will come into their own before the first frost and will be added to a stew, I am sure.

The chickens are giving us at least one egg a day and I have hopes that before the winter comes rolling in there will be more than one in the nesting boxes in a day.

This garden has been a refuge for Jenn and I this summer. We are already planning our cover crops, talking about what to do different next year, and plans for expanding the chicken run in the spring. Just because the growing season is over doesn't mean the work is done.

Two Eggs...

Although the laying isn't consistent yet, when whomever does lay is laying, double yolks seem to come up rather often. Eggs come about every other day and we have given some to two friends who have helped us maintain this urban farm through all the surgeries and treatments.

The yolks aren't as orange as I would like, but the girls are young. I tired a bite of one this morning and they taste great. I had been a bit squeamish about eating the eggs for some reason. Like, I might be eating Dolly's unfertilized baby. weird, I know, but it has passed.

In preparation for winter, we are squirreling away food. I've never canned or made pickles or jelly or jam but with all the food we've grown, there has been plenty to practice on. I did peeled tomatoes with basil and a few jars of pickled beans today. Tomorrow, I'll chop and seed some heirlooms and freeze them. We are trying many methods of food preservation to include drying herbs, and Roma tomatoes. I can see myself using them with pasta around January when tomatoes in the market taste like paper. Next week, I'll harvest cabbage and attempt a kim chi. After that, who knows. There are pumpkins still growing, squash, and so many more beans that we if we can them all, we can be eating green beans everyday for months!

Jenn has worked hard to make the farm produce, and I've kicked in some too. We did what we set out to. Grow food, share it with friends, and have a steady and healthy supply of organic food for ourselves. Does it get any better than that!

This is crazy

I knew that we would get a bountiful harvest. I know we would have good food to share with friends. I knew there would be enough to can and preserve and turn into pickles, but I did not realize just how much food a 10 by 25 foot piece of ground could produce. We have not had a need to go to the farmer's market in nearly a month and the only thing we really buy at the store are spinach and oranges.

The chickens have yet to lay an egg. I know it will come in the middle of September. That's my non-educated guess.

Jenn maed plum preserves that didn't quite set up, but it will make for nice syrup, a part of a compote, and I'm betting it will be good on vanilla bean ice cream or pound cake or angel food cake, or a whole lot of things. The grapes we harvested from the alley have been cooked and are draining nicely thru the cheese cloth and it will be jelly time this evening.

I am working on pickling, cukes, green beans, and I think I am going to do a jalapeno and Thai chile mix.

Seeds are still be harvested and dried for next year, and we bought a pink toilet to plant with herbs and flowers. A not real pig named Charlotte has been added to the artscape.

Stop by sometime, sit a minute and take in the beauty. You never know what you will find. This morning it was baby lady bugs!